Mont D'Olmes Time-Lapse

Time-lapse of the my home in the mountains......

This post has a link to TWO separate time-lapse videos.
Each time-lapse is taken over 30 minutes.



The first is looking off the Hotel's back balcony towards the summit of Mont D'Olmes.
The second looks back towards the Hotel from the summit of Mont D'Olmes.

Enjoy, My backyard...











**if you'd like to see the videos in full resolution go here.
www.oregonstate.edu/~gallatyj/images/france

The adventrure of Cheese, Cliff and Skreech.

We spent a few hours atop Mont D'Olmes, above the clouds & in the sun... :)




Panorama and 15 second video of a 30 Minute time-laps looking down from the summit of Mont D'Olmes towards the Hotel...
If it was a clear day, you could clearly see "Hotel-Club Les Arilles" in the middle of the shot, instead you see the pretty clouds dancing away.

Aww Nuts.

Anywhere that's home to 130,000 students can't really fail to be busy, buzzing place with terrific cafe's and bars. Toulouse, not quite in the Pyrenees, is an absolutely beautiful city.

Aside from the frigid weather and even snowfall, Toulouse has been a fantastic place to spend a few days. Just as Paris, I'm staying with a friends met this past summer while in Paris.

Andrew
"Hi!"
-Hannah



Filled with young adults and out of the cold sleet. Live music and reasonably priced drinks drew us into the small bar. Drinks were had and all was merry. It was my turn to pick up the next round. Unaware of the bartenders English fluency, I easily ordered a round. I've had much practice in this area and tonight was no trouble.

Back at the table a murmur of food aroused. Distributed by the bartender, Naomi's keen eyes spotted the bucket of peanuts freely handed out to the bars patrons. Fueled with several round of liquid language enhancer, I volunteered to ask for the peanuts.

"Je voudrais des cacahetes," I uneasily spoke. Not sure if cacahetes was the correct word.

Wide-eyed with stunned amazement, the bartender - a lady in her mid-fifties - slowly turned away to fetched me the tray of nuts I requested.

"Cacahetes" was the right word, but just as nuts in english refer to your man-bits, so to do cacahetes in French.

Upon her return, she lent towards me. With a thick French accent and a big smile, told me to practice my French somewhere else. She then erupted in laugher, attracting much attention.

A very confused, "quoi?" was my response.

With an awkward smile she told me what she'd heard.
"Je touche des cacahetes" - "I touch nuts."

Bright eyed and red faced I muttered "Aw, dammit," just as my surrounding erupted with laugher. My efforts to explain myself where in vein...

I'll never mumble "voudrai" again.

I've Arrived!

Just as we each have a dust covered box or drawer full of our most treasured possessions; We each store a lifetime of memories tied to something much less tangible. It may be months or even years, but when these moments happen, it takes us to a time and place that is very personal.

Walking around Toulouse is like walking around any other French city. You must always keep your eyes on full alert for the ever present - and copious - piles of dog poop. For the french, it seems a "faux pas" to make any effort to cleaning up after your dog. No matter where you are... Trains, subways, sidewalks, parks, etc...
They are professionals at turning a blind shoulder.

-No matter to you, nor should this mean anything special. I will cover "French People" on some other rant... :)





But today signaled my true arrival back to Europe.
Complete with Tabasco and Celery Salt, I ordered my first tomato juice.


Andrew & Chris,
Cheers!




(Written Sunday, March 23)

On the rails again.

Train rides can be blog times!


You'd think after doing this for 4 months I'd have learned my lesson...
But that would take all the fun out of the adventure right?

It's my first train ride of this trip and I'm as hung over as a seasick dog thats just ate a bar of soap. Rolling out at 7:30 and crossing Paris on a Saturday morning was a breeze. Two metro lines; line 1 and line 4, from Bastille transferring at Chalet on-route to Gare Montparnasse Bienvenue to catch my 9:20 TGV to Toulouse. This 6.5 hour train would slice a direct route south-south-west through most of France.




Wait wait wait...

Did I say easy trip to through Paris? Oh, I'm sorry I was totally kidding.
I almost forgot! I was hung-over!

The trip itself would have been fine... except for the whole subway experience: frequent stopping, violent shutters and constant swaying as it bounces its way underground from station to station.

Anyone who has had the lovely experience of mixing alcoholic syrup-enhanced white wine and dark Belgian beer will tell you that this is a HORRIBLE way to start a hang-over morning.

Keep in mind, I'm not exactly traveling light. Slung snugly over my shoulders I am carrying six months worth of gear. A BIG 91 liter Eagle Creek travel pack, packed full of clothing, shoes, books and other misc goodies. 45lbs in total on my back and worn reverse-style on my front, another slightly smaller day-pack. This 13lb pack is home to everything essential and expensive. Zipped away in an - always - visible pocket are my credit cards, passport and travel money. Everything you'd need in a pinch. Also included in this pack; laptop, camera and the ever important nalgene bottle, full of cool, delicious water.

Thanks to the front pack, balance is not an issue, but I'm not exactly light on my feet. Nor am I the most maneuverable object on a subway car. Sitting was out of the question, so I pressed my way into a carefully selected gap and I braced myself for the hellish ride... Rocking too and fro, shuttering from side to side I set off on the 30 minute ride through Paris' ass of an underground. The battle was epic, fighting the waves of cold sweat, light-headedness and the increasing urge to puke on the awful smelling bum to my side.

Stepping off the metro car into the cold, pungent, urine smelling air of the Montparnasse metro station was one of the single most rewarding experiences of my life...

The short trek to the TGV Gare gave me a glimpse of hope that maybe I'd be alright. I arrived to my platform with 30 minutes to spare and there I sat silently, blood slowly returning to my pale-white face.

Boarding was soon called and I made my way to my designated car. Unlike the rest of the trains all over Europe, the TGV's have strict seating assignments and compulsory seat reservations. A sparse peppering of heads could be seen from the aisle with many open seats. I was thrilled of the possibility to have a bench all to myself to sprawl out! I walked down the aisle towards my seat. Hidden until the last moment was a short elderly lady. I squeezed by and cough a whiff of the most rancid stinky cheese B.O. I've ever experienced. Europeans have a tendency to be a bit stinky but this was a new record. My once joyous moment of an empty seat smashed to pieces as I found myself shit out of luck. Not only did she smell like dank old cheese sandwich left in the sun for days, but she was eating something that smelled nearly as equal as her!

My stomach a-boil again... I put my headphones in and attempted to make the best if a stinky situation. I struggled to get in a comfortable position.

At 9:20 the train purred to life and with the slightest of tugs, we were on our way. Devastation once again dashed what little hope I had remaining to recover from the last evenings "beaucoup de boissons."

As if it couldn't possibly get any worse...

My assigned seat was facing backwards... (The seat layout on all train cars are 50/50 front/back) A bad time to realize that I have also forgotten to take a Dramamine! For those of you who don't know...I am VERY sensitive to motion sickness; 150 mph backwards for 6.5 hours amidst one of my most epic hang-overs = I'm doomed. Frantically I scrambled to locate one of my lifesaving pills, downed as much water as I could stomach, closed my eyes and said a little prayer.




What a shit morning.

But, It's now 2:30 and I'm glad to say I'm still alive!
Chunk-free and the cheese lady even got off!!! WOOHOOO

PDX_ to Charles De Gualle_ (ouch my balls)

Well, it sure as hell started off with a BANG.

Ed's salvage job of a bitching lil 12in G4 worked great! I made it to Portland in the early evening and had a GREAT time at R's Palette with the GD crew as we took over the entire 1st floor! Nice work GD Crew!

I said my good byes at R's and headed out to meet up with Brown. The goal was to be home by 10... but 12:30 was the magical number. I frantically finished transferring files from laptop to laptop and managed a massively useless 2 hours of sleep. Got up at 3AM and rallied the parents. We got to PDX at 4:05AM for a 6:04AM flight, plenty of time to check-in and get through security...

That was the plan anyway...

But, I got totally fucked by passport control, and thus began the shittiest day of travel I've yet encountered.

I was denied my boarding pass at 4:10AM because of Visa complications. My 90 day work Visa DID NOT extend my 90 day Schwengen visa. I was assured that I would have a full 180 days of EU eligibility by my employers... WRONG

As my passport was scanned, computers all over the world went "beep" "beep" "beep" and many red lights flashed... This was all very confusing to me. The United Airlines staff then informed me in the most "NON-sympathetic" (and I stress NON) way as only an airlines can, of how very stupid I was for booking a 6 month ticket with a 3 month visa... Once again I was VERY confused.

They offered similar helpful advice on how to rectify the situation... NONE.

So now very sleepy, confused, slightly hung-over and in awe of my current situation, 5AM rolled around. Logically the only quick fix to get me on a plane was to cancel my return ticket and RE-purchase a new return ticket within 90 days. At a whopping $1,125, lube not included.

This certainly was not an option as I only had available $700.00 until I start earning the much needed Euro's that would be funding my Summer travels!

The next viable solution was to contact my travel agency and change my return ticket. This would be the cheapest way to temporarily fix the problem. I would have to change my return ticket to 90 days from my departure flight to let me get on a plane. You might be thinking, "damn Josh, quit your bitching, change your flight and go!" Oh, I wish.

First problem:
The travel office didn't open till 7AM... ONE whole hour after my flight left, putting me in jeopardy of voiding my entire ticket. My only saving grace was a 6.5 hour layover in Chicago which became the needed trip-saving buffer!

While waiting for the travel office to open, I let my mom deal with staff at the United desk... Go Mama, go! Nothing like a pissed off mom to start off the United workers day. She got my flight moved to the 11:30AM to Chicago, arriving just 30 minutes before my connecting flight was to depart for Charles De Gualle!

After several hours on the phone, a years worth of stress, 2 dropped calls while on hold and $215.00 later... I had changed my return ticket to June 16th; Still 2 weeks before the end of my work contract, but it got me on the plane!

Now that I am here, I can take a breather. I will have to deal with the airlines again to Re-extent my ticket to September... for another non-negotiable fee, but I will save that battle for another day.

But, I made it!




Ah, the joys of travel.

Go time.

Well, shit, it's 3am. Definatly cannot sleep.

We drive to portland in... 3 hours. Woohoo!
My flight leaves at 1:20. lufthansa!

But, before we head to the airport we have to stop at Schroeder's house.

I have been planning this backpacking trip for weeks and somehow forgot about the whole "backpack" part.
Living out of my backpack for weeks would not have worked out so well.
Luckily for me, Schroeder has a nice Europe ready backpack for me to use.
THANKS BUD!!!


Next post... Lithuania!